NOTE FOR AHN(安), GALLERY 175, SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA, 2019
Exhibition Note for AHN (安) was a two-person exhibition I organized with Ahn Jaeyoung, which began from the question of whether an individual could escape from being possessed — one of the mysterious symptoms containing elements of superstition from Korea. The exhibition, tracks how images attained from one’s superstitious beliefs relate to mythical and religious images, then recombines and deconstructs them. Under our collaboration lies the hope to contact invisible but clearly existing sensual phenomena, and to together overcome anxieties, interpreting phenomena as the destiny of artist/mediator.
Paying attention to the number of tattoos on Ahn Jaeyoung‘s body (the Chinese character 安, a blue diamond, an arrow, a red-haired Anne, Piglet, Mickey Mouse, and an epitaph of Nikos Kazantzakis), I interpreted each image as a charm to ward off Ahn’s anxieties. I then, researched mythical and religious imagery in order to strengthen the shamanistic narrative. Observing that the number 12 frequently works as important motive in the myths of many different cultures, I set Ahn Jaeyoung‘s birthday, December 12, as a central axis and tried to discover the references to god-related signs from the number 12. Combining the symbolic world of the image, language, color, and numbers from ancient myths from twelve animals that guards tombs, I created a chart for a system of faith and proposed a psychological space for a praying man, just like the secret connotation of the ancient character, 安
NOTE FOR AHN(安), GALLERY 175, SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA, 2019
Exhibition Note for AHN (安) was a two-person exhibition I organized with Ahn Jaeyoung, which began from the question of whether an individual could escape from being possessed — one of the mysterious symptoms containing elements of superstition from Korea. The exhibition, tracks how images attained from one’s superstitious beliefs relate to mythical and religious images, then recombines and deconstructs them. Under our collaboration lies the hope to contact invisible but clearly existing sensual phenomena, and to together overcome anxieties, interpreting phenomena as the destiny of artist/mediator.
Paying attention to the number of tattoos on Ahn Jaeyoung‘s body (the Chinese character 安, a blue diamond, an arrow, a red-haired Anne, Piglet, Mickey Mouse, and an epitaph of Nikos Kazantzakis), I interpreted each image as a charm to ward off Ahn’s anxieties. I then, researched mythical and religious imagery in order to strengthen the shamanistic narrative. Observing that the number 12 frequently works as important motive in the myths of many different cultures, I set Ahn Jaeyoung‘s birthday, December 12, as a central axis and tried to discover the references to god-related signs from the number 12. Combining the symbolic world of the image, language, color, and numbers from ancient myths from twelve animals that guards tombs, I created a chart for a system of faith and proposed a psychological space for a praying man, just like the secret connotation of the ancient character, 安
Installation view of Jan van eyck academie openstudios 2021 Still cut, The geometry of the hunter, Single channel video, 2021
눈동자 넓이의 구멍으로 볼 수 있는 것, 전주시, 2016
이 프로젝트는 전주시 성매매집결지 선미촌에서 우연히 줍게된 타인의 인조 속눈썹으로부터 장소와 나, 성매매여성과 나 사이에 우발적으로 발생한 좁혀진 거리감에 관한 사유에서 출발하였다. 속눈썹이 가진 여러겹의 휘어진 곡선형태를 조형적으로 확장하여 관객의 신체를 구속하는 긴 통로를 만들어 그 사이를 통과하도록 제안하였고, 이를 통해 여성을 향한 오랜 억압의 역사를 은유하고자 했다. 통로의 입구는 포주의 방에 나있는 낮고 좁은 문으로, 출구는 폐허가 된 개인의 집으로 설정하였다.
What can be seen through the width of a pupil,
Jeonju city, SOUTH KOREA, 2016
Triggered by the false eyelashes I picked up from the red light district, I began the project in my contemplation of the accidentally narrowed distance between the site and myself, as well as a sex worker and me. Formally expanding the curves of the eyelashes, I made a long pathway that restrained viewers’ bodies through the passage, becoming a metaphor for the long history of oppression against women. The entrance begins from the low, narrow door of the pimp’s room, and the exit is the door of a ruined house of an individual.
Image & Text, 2016
Through old newspaper archives: Naver Digital News Archives, I researched the history of prostitution in Korea from Japanese colonialism(1910-1945) until the present.
What I noticed was not only the historical fact that the articles contained but also the image-text relation that reflects the way of perceiving the world. I then aim to reveal the heterosexual perspective that represents women as sexual objects, for the pleasure of the male viewer.